On a bit of a whim but also on a kind of dream, I bought a new domain name this past week: slowtechmovement.com. I’ve been considering the concept of Time a lot lately. The language we have around Time is so interesting. We save, spend, and buy time, commoditizing it. We lose, waste, and gain time, measuring and judging it. We stretch time, anthropomorphizing it. We always have the same amount of time available to us, and yet we search for more of it. For people doing social justice work or...
20 days ago • 1 min read
Over the past year I’ve heard some really interesting takes on imposter syndrome. I deeply appreciated the passion with which Reshma Saujani (Founder of Girls Who Code) spoke at Smith College about imposter syndrome being “a tool” and a “strategy” - an external force that is used to hold people (women, specifically) down by convincing them there is something wrong with them. Saujani also touched on an important concept with one line about how institutions were not built for her, noting that...
26 days ago • 3 min read
Apparently November 17th-23rd is National Apprentice Week in the United States. How did we get to this place in our weird history as a country that we have a day, a week, a month for every little thing? OK sure, Black History and Pride aren’t little things, they are big things. But they are now in the same category as Apprenticeship? I don’t know, this seems a little suspect to me. It feels a little too influenced by the Greeting Card Industrial Complex. I love going to a good Pride parade,...
about 1 month ago • 4 min read
Earning trust takes time. It takes so much time and so much consistency. There are ways that this trust-earning can get sped up - usually through some extreme circumstances that force people to get down deep and dirty together, to overcome an impossible situation, or to be put through intense experiences together. I love a good conversation about how to ethically and responsibly put people through experiences like this on purpose. But there isn’t always a need to speed up the trust building...
about 1 month ago • 1 min read
Vu Le is basically my favorite super hero. I am in awe of what he has and continues to build with Nonprofit AF and Crappy Funding Practices. I’ve read every newsletter or article that Vu has sent out since I first encountered his work, and I will try to attend any talk, webinar, or workshop he is a part of. He is a rockstar and I am a groupie. And now another disclosure about me: I did not vote for Donald Trump, but I took no joy in voting for Kamala Harris. I am completely disillusioned by...
about 1 month ago • 5 min read
Hello friend, I hope that you have the support and resources that you need in this moment. What kinds of support and resources might those be? For me right now, one of the greatest forms of support and one of the greatest resources that provides me strength is engaging in deep, challenging, explorative, disruptive, uncomfortable conversations. These conversation take a lot of energy, but for me they are equally generative and energizing. As a young student, I loved being in debate club in...
about 1 month ago • 2 min read
Dear friend, I’m a person who has been in therapy since I was a kid. Sometimes it is just nice to have someone to talk to. Sometimes it has saved my life. I view therapy like medication - I need to take it for my mental health, even on the days I’m feeling good. On the latest Death, Sex and Money episode, Anna Sale speaks with Dr. Orna Guralnik, the amazing therapist from the docu-series Couples Therapy. I absolutely adore this woman and her psychoanalytic approach. In the interview, Orna...
6 months ago • 1 min read
Dear friend, Two of my absolute favorite organizations are going down the wrong path. It isn’t a bad path. It isn’t an evil path. It isn’t a stupid path. It is simply the wrong path. Both these organizations provide learning/training experiences to people working in nonprofits. Both these organizations are beloved by the people who know them. Both these organizations have the potential and the right people to have huge impacts on nonprofit staff members. But…. In the effort to “meet learners...
7 months ago • 1 min read
Dear Friend, Did you catch any of the Eurovision song contest this year? I’ve been raving about it so much around my house that my wife asked me if somehow in 13 years of being together she hadn’t realized that I was into this thing. She hadn’t missed something - this was really my first year of watching any of it. I actually only tuned in after it was all over, watching the semi-final performances on YouTube. Excuse me - but why hadn’t anyone told me that Eurovision is also referred to as...
7 months ago • 2 min read